


A Day of Peace and Quiet

by Peanut_Butter_Octopus



Category: Captain Underpants Series - Dav Pilkey
Genre: A whole 19 pages' worth of torture on Google Docs, Have fun with this bullshit, High fever, Sickfic, ambulance, hallucination, pent up anger
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-18
Updated: 2017-06-17
Packaged: 2018-11-15 11:10:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,296
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11229729
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Peanut_Butter_Octopus/pseuds/Peanut_Butter_Octopus
Summary: Krupp gets sick and stays home from work, but things go awry, and he spends the lump sum of three days in a consistent state of peril and torment.





	1. Uuuugh, Why Me? Why This?

It was late, very late, around 2 or 3 in the morning, when Krupp woke up in pain, the moonlight causing a ridiculous grinding pain behind his eyes, and his position causing a sharp pain in his back, and his muscles seeming to have tightened up a hundred times over. His entire being was radiating with pain. 

 

Krupp sighed, and sat up, struggling to lift his arms from his sides to rub his eyes and climb out of bed. He felt the disgusting pull of his pajama shirt against the fabric of his sheets, having been glued there by sweat that was pretty much coating his face and back. 

 

To make matters worse, the voice in the back of his head was making a lot of noise. “Benny, why are we up so early?,” his alternate identity complained in the back of his head. Krupp just groaned, and shuffled to the bathroom, flicking on the light and clenching his eyes shut to block out the painful rays. 

 

“I’m not sure, alright? Now shut up,” Krupp ordered the obnoxious man-child in the back of his conscious thoughts, as he surveyed his appearance in his bathroom mirror, which was beginning to look a bit distressed and clouded it was so old. 

 

Krupp’s eyes were hollow and lifeless, almost like always, but more so tonight. His cheeks were rounded and swollen, as though he’d managed to get fatter in a matter of hours.

 

Now that he thought about it… his cheeks had gained an alarming flush since he went to bed… he should do something about that. Then again, Krupp was pretty sure he didn’t have a thermometer lying around anywhere that was both safe for someone like him to use, and properly working. 

 

Krupp groaned, and rolled his eyes, finding an old mercury one, that seemed to work well enough. But it was covered with dust, so he rinsed it off, and popped it into his mouth. He waited, but he could still hear the annoying complaints of the toddler with whom he shared a body. 

 

“Benny, what’s in your mouth? It tastes funny,” Captain complained within Krupp’s subconscious. Krupp growled, but tried his hardest for his mouth to remain completely still, otherwise he’d grind his teeth, and shatter the glass thermometer in his mouth, which would only add to his pain. 

 

“Shut up, I have to let it register,” Krupp ordered, by way of his thoughts, he couldn’t be bothered to even open his mouth to speak with his alternate identity. He was sweaty, he was sore, and he wanted to crawl back into bed, and drown his sorrows in a bottle of ice cold water. 

 

Krupp mentally counted one minute in his head, and removed the thermometer, struggling to read the tiny numbers on the mercury stick where the red line reached. He really needed to buy another thermometer, one that was fast, and one that worked.

 

“103.9…. Shit,” Krupp mumbled, pressing the back of his fist against his forehead and clenching his eyes shut. He’d probably have to call in, it wouldn’t be very responsible of him to come to school, and faint, and not be productive in the slightest. It would be a powerful move, so to speak, it’d prove his strength and resilience, but it would also be a waste of a day, and his time. 

 

Krupp groaned, threw the thermometer against the wall, and trudged to his kitchen, grabbing the one glass he managed to find in his cupboard, and filling it up with water, before going back into his bedroom. 

 

“Benny, what’s the matter?,” Captain asked from behind Krupp’s eyes, causing nothing more than an extra pain to influence him to fling the glass of water at his wall, shattering it. But, Krupp refrained, and sat down on his bed to explain. 

 

“We’re too hot, alright? That’s my idiot’s answer, and that’s all you get for tonight, Now go to bed, and don’t screw around in my head while I sleep,” Krupp grumbled to himself. He noticed that his voice was strained, and hoarse-sounding, but he didn’t care, he just wanted to drift into sweet, colorless, soundless sleep. 

 

Krupp only got a good two hours of sleep, before he shot up, clutching his abdomen and biting his lip. How did everything manage to go downhill in two hours? Krupp didn’t have time to complain about this, he had business to handle. 

 

Holding one hand tightly over his mouth, and the other to his stomach, Krupp raced to the bathroom, and ducked his head into the toilet bowl, retching emptily. He hadn’t eaten anything, so he didn’t vomit anything. How tragic, it would’ve been satisfying. 

 

Krupp shoved himself away from the toilet, and leaned back against the wall, sweat rolling down his face in beads, soaking the collar of his pajama shirt, and beginning to soak his back. This was ridiculous, his fever must have gone up. 

 

Aw fuck! He broke his thermometer earlier, he can’t take his temperature again. Well, there’s only one thing to do about that. Despite it being about thirty degrees outside, and it being four in the morning, Krupp had to tug on his shoes, and slide his jacket over his back, and walk to the general store to get another one. 

 

Krupp trudged along the ice cold sidewalk, groaning and mumbling to himself about his own stupidity. Everything felt heavy, and he just wanted to go to sleep right on the sidewalk, but he couldn’t, because he’d destroy either the sidewalk, or his face with the pressure. 

 

Finally, Krupp approached the general store’s front door, a 24-hour establishment that sold virtually whatever he needed. Great. He had to deal with some apathetic teenager who wanted to be anywhere but here, in order to buy a functioning thermometer, a box of tissues, a box of tea, and medicine strong enough to give him a sufficient amount of sleep. 

 

Krupp was struggling, exhausted, to read the labels on the boxes in the thermometer section. A bunch of techno-nonsense about register times, sensor technology, and rubber tips. All Krupp wanted was a thin electronic machine that was supposed to read the temperature of his mouth, and thus the temperature of his entire body.

 

Krupp angrily grabbed the first one he saw with the lowest price in big, bold, black print, and put it in his basket. A box of tissues with the highest sheet count on the front, so he wouldn’t have to buy another one, went straight into his basket. And finally, both a box of tea with an unknown name, flavor and purpose, along with medicine that was supposed to knock him out for a good few hours. 

 

Ringing up his items, and getting a strange look from the store clerk, Krupp simply paid for his things, grabbed the thin plastic bag, and trudged out the door of the general store. 

 

Back along the icy sidewalk, Krupp continued to trudge his way back to his house, watching very slow and silent subtle traffic pass him by. People on road trips, and police officers on late night stakeouts. Obnoxious and unnecessary, the lot of them. 

 

Opening the door to his house, and slamming it shut again, Krupp threw his jacket on the coat rack near his door, and kicked off his shoes, before heading back to the bathroom with his plastic bag. 

 

Attempting to take the thermometer out of the box made Krupp want to give up and let his fever rise without knowing, at least then he’d pass out in the middle of the day without having gone through the torture of trying to take something out of its packaging without a struggle. 

 

Finally, Krupp peeled back the casing of the thermometer, and groaned in dismay, upon figuring out this was one of the thermometers you put in your ear, and Krupp was not in the mood to deal with this, probing his ear was one of the things he used to hate as a child. 

 

Well, there was no use trying to avoid it, Krupp was going to have to deal with it anyway if he passed out and wound up in the hospital when the mailman found him drenched in sweat and unconscious in his doorway. 

 

Krupp sighs, and plants the rubber nozzle in his ear, and melts at the sound of the high pitched beeping, right in his ear. Krupp sighed, and removed the thermometer from his ear, and looked at the bright view screen, which was flashing and red. 

 

“104.5….I’m not going to stay awake to handle this, I can’t…. I’m just going to get hopped up on this cold medicine, and go to bed,” Krupp groaned, wiping the sweat off of his forehead, before stumbling to the rack next to his shower. 

 

Grabbing the smaller towel, and running cold water over it, Krupp stared at his reflection. His eyes were dilated and bloodshot, and his nose was a more vibrant shade of red than his cheeks. Sticking out his tongue, and looking at his wet, shimmering teeth, Krupp noticed the back of his throat was red. Another thing to take notice of. 

 

Krupp turned off the cold water, and wrung it out into the sink, before folding it in half, and walking to his bedroom with it. 

 

Sitting on his bed, and pouring himself a dose of the awkwardly-colored medication, Krupp tilted his head back, and let the disgusting, alcohol-tasting liquid slide down his throat. It was disgusting, Krupp stuck his tongue out in dismay. 

 

Krupp’s nose started to itch, and he just rubbed it aggressively with his hand, and went to sleep. 


	2. Relaxation, At Last

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Krupp spends a nice day at home relaxing, and everything seemed to be alright as his temperature continued to rise.

Two more hours.

 

Krupp got two more hours of sleep, before being awakened by both a sharp pain in the back of his throat, a sinking feeling in his stomach, a bed seemingly drowning him in his own sweat, and his obnoxious alarm clock. 

 

Krupp growled angrily, yanking the alarm clock up so it would unplug, and flinging it at the wall ahead of him, breaking it in half. Krupp could not be bothered today, not in the slightest. 

 

“Benny! It’s time to wake up! We’re going to be late for work!,” the annoyingly consistent nagging voice in the back of his head insisted. Krupp groaned, pulling at his lower eyelids, and kicking in place. He did not have another second to waste on this obnoxious fool. 

 

“We aren’t going to work you moron, now shut up and leave me alone!,” Krupp yelled at himself, before bucking his eyes and whimpering in pain as he tucked his head between his legs. That only made his headache worse, he was an idiot. 

 

Krupp sighed, and got up, feeling a deep, bone-shattering pain radiating throughout his body. Overwhelmed, he found himself falling to the floor, and being able to do nothing but stare at the ceiling, and sweat. Two things, he was particularly not in favor of at the moment. 

 

Krupp pulled himself off of the floor, and stumbled to the bathroom, only to fall back onto the floor halfway to the door. “I’m not in the mood to deal with this today!,” Krupp moaned, pounding his fist against the hardwood, and putting a dent in his floor. Great, now he had to worry about tripping over the dent whenever he walked back to the bathroom. No matter, he’d deal with that later. 

 

Krupp sighed, and sat on his toilet, with the lid closed, calling the school and informing them that he wouldn’t be going, no he didn’t know how long, and no he didn’t exactly understand why it came on so fast either.

 

Krupp groaned in pain after finishing his call, and grabbed the thermometer off of the edge of his sink, placing it in his ear, and clenching his teeth, waiting for the ear-shattering beep. 

 

Removing it from his ear, he could still hear the repetitive, high-pitched screeching of the thermometer, as the bright red screen continued to blink. 

 

“105.1… welp, if it melts my brains at least I’ll be free from dealing with this nonsense,” Krupp grumbled, placing the thermometer back on the sink’s counter, and turning around, heading back to bed. 

 

Only to trip, on the goddamn dent, he  **_just_ ** put in the floor. Krupp groaned, rubbing his head, and dragging himself along the hardwood into his bedroom.

 

Krupp took a deep breath, and opened his eyes wide upon feeling an awkward rattling in his chest, and clenched them upon coughing up something disgusting and milky. Ugh, another symptom to tack onto the imaginary list in the back of his head. 

 

Krupp decided that he might as well enjoy himself if he’s going to be stuck at home, and he doesn’t really want to spend his time tripping over the dent he made in his floor on the way to the bathroom. 

 

Krupp grabbed the blanket off of his bed, and wrapped it around himself, before grabbing the ice cold towel and walking into his living room. 

 

Krupp snuggled, nuzzling himself into his slightly comfortable chair, and grabbing the remote, flicking on the TV. Some random movie was playing, it’s not exactly entertaining, but it isn’t something Krupp has to focus a whole lot of his attention onto either. It was nice, all of this was nice. 

 

Krupp nuzzled his face deeper into his blanket, and started to fall asleep, his eyes growing heavy as he yawned under the sound of the movie. 

 

Krupp woke up about four hours later, his eyes now wide open, and his body still warm from being wrapped in the blanket. A different movie was playing now, it might be Jurassic Park, Krupp wasn’t sure. Eh, not to worry, maybe at some point in the day his ability to focus on anything more than his immediate surroundings would return, and he’d be able to coherently watch one of these things. 

 

Krupp yawned, and stretched his arms wide before unwrapping himself from the blanket and shuffling into his kitchen to make some of the tea he drowsily bought at the general store last night. 

 

Picking up the box, Krupp discovered that he could actually read the label now. Great, at least he wouldn’t accidentally make this wrong and destroy his microwave. That was the last thing he needed right now. 

 

The tea was Earl Grey, and it had lavender in it, so it’d smell nice. He’d take a few sips, and it’d ease the pain in the back of his throat, along with helping him fall back asleep. 

 

Krupp filled a mug from the back of his cupboard with water, and put it in the microwave for three minutes, before heading back to the bathroom, being very careful to avoid the floor dent, to take his temperature again.

 

“104.3,” Krupp sighed, his fever was going down, that was good, no surprise he felt more coherent now that his mind wasn’t clouded with heat. Krupp edged around the floor dent again, and headed back to the kitchen to grab his mug out of the microwave. 

 

Opening the microwave, and carefully removing the mug, Krupp dropped one of the tea bags into the hot water, letting it steep for one minute, before removing the bag with a spoon, and squeezing it to get any extra tea out, throwing it in the trash afterwards. 

 

Krupp took his mug of tea, and returned to his comfortable chair, wrapping himself back in his blanket, and changing the channel. Full House was on, and Krupp had always found that something interesting to watch. 

 

Krupp grabbed a tissue from the box on his coffee table, and blew his nose, tossing the tissue close to a trash can, he couldn’t make it all the way in, and focusing his attention on the show.

 

Krupp took the ice cold towel that he’d brought with him, and wiped his sweat with it. It felt wonderful against his hot skin, like a gentle breeze during a heat wave. It was heavenly. 

 

Krupp sighed, as he got lost in the world of three intermingled generations under one roof together. He even found himself chuckling at a particular joke. Well, he was coughing, but he felt like chuckling at that specific moment.

 

Krupp took a sip of his tea, it was perfect, it was warm, and it soothed his raw, tender throat. Krupp set the mug back down on his coffee table, and wrapped himself tighter in his blanket, he was starting to get cold, it was frigid outside. 

 

Krupp got up from his chair, still wrapped in his blanket, went over to his blanket closet, and grabbed another, thicker blanket from the top shelf, and wrapped himself up in both blankets, before snuggling back up into his chair.

 

Krupp settled in his chair, wiggling his toes to find them secure and warm in his blanket. Krupp found that he was at his most comfortable, this was amazing. He should let himself be sick more often. Character is great yes, but lying back in his nice, comfortable chair with a high fever on an ice cold winter day was nice. 

 

Krupp found that his eyes were beginning to get heavy again, and his head still hurt. He was still sweating, but he felt comfortable under the blankets. His temperature might have gone up again, but no matter, he’ll take it again when he gets out of the shower tonight. Closing his eyes gently, Krupp drifted off to sleep.

 

Krupp woke up to an episode of Home Improvement subtly playing in front of him, and a fresh, hot cup of tea on his coffee table. Did he go back in time? What on- Oh wait. Here’s a pink sticky note, with sloppy writing on it. 

 

“Hiya Benny!” the note read, “Somebody snapped on TV and I decided to make you some tea before you woke up! I also turned up the heat a little, it was barely on when I checked. Bye Benny!”.

 

It also read, in smaller letters on the back, “P.S., I used that weird plastic thing in my ear, it said ‘105.3’,”.

 

Krupp looked confused, but he wasn’t in any more pain than whatever he had caught was causing, and the fool was smart enough to have taken their temperature before turning himself back, and to not go romping around town in his underpants. Krupp was thankful he was still nice and snug in his blankets, and that he had all of his clothes on. 

 

Krupp picked up his mug, and took another relaxing sip of his tea. This glass had a little bit of sugar in it. Krupp has no clue how that man managed to get a hold of sugar, but it was nice.

 

Krupp wrinkled his nose, and blew it on another tissue from the box, before tossing it at the garbage can, over the past few hours, his nose had gotten quite runny, and he had gone through half the box of tissues, the trashcan was overflowing, and there were tissues surrounding it. 

 

Krupp sat through about an hour of some random television show that he barely paid any attention to, before he yawned, and curled himself back up into his blankets, falling asleep.


	3. We're Going To Have a Problem Here

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Krupp's fever takes a turn for the worst, and he begins to face complications as he gets two small visitors to help him out.

About another two hours later, and Krupp realized that he’d spent almost all day asleep. Suddenly it felt much hotter, and Krupp tensed up a little, removing himself from his cocoon of blankets and trudging to the bathroom. 

 

And he tripped on the dent in the floor again, goddamn it! Krupp, out of pure unbridled rage, jumped up and stomped until the dent in the floor leveled out. Krupp was relieved that was over, until he realized that all the stomping had cracked the base of his wall, which only made him angrier. Krupp couldn’t find anything near him to throw, so he simply punched the wall, creating a hole in the plaster and a dent in one of the support frames of his house. 

 

Krupp growled in anger, because he couldn’t leave that alone. He wasn’t really in the mood to listen to extremely loud construction noises while he was trying to rest, so he simply braced his feet against the edge of the floor, gripped the beam with one hand, and gripped the rest of the wall with the other, pulling to straighten the beam again. 

 

Krupp sighed in relief, before noticing that his pulling had knocked a nail loose inside the beam, and now it was wobbling. 

 

Krupp was suddenly hit with a wave of nausea and dizziness, and leaned against the wall, holding the back of his hand against his burning forehead. God, he really needed to take his temperature again. 

 

Krupp, both seething with anger and shutting down from fever, sat on the floor, his back still to the wall, and lost all consciousness. 

 

Krupp jolted awake, only to find himself sitting upright in bed, blankets draped over his lower half, and an ice pack on his forehead. 

 

“What the?,” Krupp asked himself, scratching his head and looking around, only to get dizzy and shut his eyes again. God, why was he so tired?

 

Krupp woke up again to find his entire body wracked with pain, and something smacking his left cheek. Nevermind it was some **one** . It was Harold. 

 

“George! He’s awake!,” Harold said excitedly. George wandered into the room, and grinned, hoisting himself up onto the bed, and placing a cool hand on Krupp’s forehead. 

 

Krupp sighed in relief, if he was going to be honest, the hand felt amazing, and he wished George would just keep the hand there forever. 

 

“W-what happened? Why are you two here?,” Krupp asked, not the least bit upset, just confused and hoarse. He sounded pitiful and congested. It was both hilariously sad, and oddly adorable. 

 

“We heard you were sick from Miss Anthrope, and we decided to visit you to see if you were alright, only to find you knocked out on the floor near your bathroom, with a hole in the wall and a chittering beam inside it,” George explained, grabbing the thermometer off of the bedside table, and placing it in Krupp’s ear. 

 

Krupp winced as he heard that ear-shattering beep of the thermometer, George removed the thermometer, and read the bright,  flashing red and blue screen. 

 

“105.9, you poor thing, maybe you should see a doctor Mr. Krupp,” Harold said, reaching over Krupp’s shoulder, and looking at the view screen. 

 

Krupp ground his teeth, and glared at both the view screen and the ceiling, “No, I’m a grown man, I don’t need to see a doctor for every sniffle, I’m fine,” Krupp grumbled, before his eyes lost focus, and his head flopped back against the pillows of his bed again. 

 

Krupp was getting rather tired of losing control of himself and passing out every fifteen minutes. When he woke up this time, the sky outside his window was dark, and the numbers on his clock revealed that it was about nine at night. George had the back of his hand against Krupp’s forehead, and the thermometer in Krupp’s ear. 

 

“105.8, okay, that’s good, I guess… not really,” George rambled. Krupp sighed in indignance, before struggling to get out of bed. “Where are you going? Just relax, Harold and I got everything under control, you’ll be fine,” George said. 

 

Krupp waved him off, and shifted his stoneset form into a sitting position facing the wall. Krupp planted one foot on the floor, and felt pain radiating through his body, causing him to grab his replacement alarm clock, one out of several that filled their own section of his backup items closet, and crack it in twain with his bare hands, before flinging it aggressively at the wall, breaking the plastic further.

 

The fritzed electricity surrounding his broken clock, and his extreme state of pain made Krupp upset and frustrated, George and Harold having broken into his house and constantly bugging him made Krupp slightly annoyed, the buffoon in the back of his head made Krupp extremely angry, and the intense damage to his house just as a reaction to his symptoms made Krupp a seething ball of anger. 

 

Krupp shot up, getting onto his knees on his bed, and yelled as loud as he possibly could, just consistent, awkward screaming. It felt good to release a lot of his unnecessary pent up anger, but it also sent the back of his throat into a spiral of intense pain. 

 

After screaming, Krupp hunched over on himself, his head between his thighs, and tears welling up in his eyes. Krupp gave a shaky inhale, and pounded his fist against his mattress. Why did everything have to be so difficult?

 

Suddenly, Krupp felt Harold’s little hands pressing into his back, and moving him back into a sitting position, leaning against the pillows on his headboard. 

 

“It’s alright Mr. Krupp, it’s alright, just relax, we’ve got this,” Harold said, holding up both hands in defense, before patting Krupp’s hand.

 

Krupp just gave a big heaving sob, his eyes beginning to overflow with tears, the salty water running down his cheeks and staining the collar of his shirt. Krupp continued to give shaky breaths in and out, whimpering slightly as he continued to cry. 

 

George climbed onto Krupp’s bed, and grabbed a tissue, wiping Krupp’s seemingly non-stop flow of tears, and rubbing Krupp’s shoulder with his free hand. “It’s gonna be okay, Mr. Krupp, you’ve gotta stop crying,” George said, staring into Krupp’s wide open, frightened, and hurt eyes with concern. 

 

Harold and George didn’t know what to do, they had never seen an adult man cry this much in a long time. Harold had only seen it once, when his little sister Heidi was born. George had seen it when Ms. Ribble got a call saying her pet cat died. 

 

Krupp buried his face in his hands, and continued to bawl, his loud, distressed cries of anguish and hurt rang throughout his bedroom, and George and Harold both got close to Krupp, and hugged his sides as tightly as they could. 

 

Krupp’s tears stopped flowing for a moment, and he closed his eyes tightly, gripping the boys’ backs with his hands as he tried to gain a grasp on reality. Everything around him phased in and out of random color filters, with odd sounds blasting into his ears. 

 

He was hallucinating. Benjamin Krupp, was lying against his bed, still in tears, hallucinating as he gripped two of his pupils for dear life. It was humiliating, he felt ashamed, he didn’t want the two boys to see him like this. 

 

Krupp felt a disturbingly sharp pain in his stomach, and shoved both boys aside, flopping forward onto his abdomen, and clutching his sides as he clenched his teeth in pain. He knew what was going to happen, and he’d better act fast, or he’d have yet another mess to clean up. 

 

Krupp struggled to roll off of his bed, and hoist himself off of the floor, stumbling into the bathroom, only to trip in the doorway, and his his head against the tile floor under his toilet. 

 

Krupp quickly yanked himself into a sitting position, holding a hand over the left side of his head, and biting his lip. He took the hand away. He was bleeding now, shit. 

 

Krupp didn’t have much time to think about the injury to his head, as the swirling, pin-sharp feeling in his gut was building up, and he yanked the toilet lid off its hinges, throwing it into his shower, putting yet  **another** dent in his wall. Perfect. 

 

Krupp held his head over the toilet bowl, and let about ten hours worth of water and tea dispense itself from his insides. It was disgusting, and when it was over, Krupp curled up into a tight ball, and started to cry again.

 

He couldn’t pull himself together long enough to stop crying or causing damage to some part of his house. He couldn’t handle himself, and he just wished that he could ignore it all, that everything bothering him would go away. 

 

Krupp got his wish, he once again disconnected with his surroundings. Everything around him became nonexistent, as his entire being was lost in a wave of black silence. 


	4. Emergency Paralleled By Safety

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Krupp's fever goes to a dangerous high, and he has to seek help, even if he doesn't want to.

Krupp woke up in bed again, hearing the world-shattering beep blaring in his ear once more. George and Harold were still there, and he was still at home. 

 

“10...Huh?... Harold… come look at this for me, I think I’m readin’ it wrong,” George said. Harold wandered to George’s side, peeking at the thermometer’s view screen, which was still beeping incessantly.

 

“You aren’t reading it wrong, that’s what it says, 106, we have to take him to the hospital George,” Harold whispered in George’s ear. Krupp wasn’t even looking at them, he was too busy, curled into a ball, and sobbing into his knees. He was shaking, and his eyes were two different sizes. 

 

George and Harold each took a hold of one of Krupp’s arms, and began to pull him out of bed. Only to have Krupp fall face-first onto the floor, putting yet another dent in his floor that he’d have to deal with later.

 

George tapped Krupp’s face, waking him up, and proceeded to help him stand, walking Krupp to the front door. 

 

Then Krupp lost consciousness again. In his doorway. With his head literally touching the pavement of his walkway.

 

Harold grabbed the landline inside Krupp’s house, and dialed 911, telling the operator that he had a man with a high fever and hallucinations unconscious in his doorway, and that he needed an ambulance, because neither himself or George could drive. 

 

The ambulance arrived, and two paramedics strapped Krupp into a stretcher, allowing Harold and George to climb into the ambulance with them and ride to the hospital. 

 

Krupp was shocked to wake up, not at home in his bed, but lying on a hospital cot, with an IV in his arm, and George and Harold sitting in chairs near the cot. His eyelids were still heavy, and every part of his body still radiated with pain. 

 

“W-where...Where am I… I’m in the hospital aren’t I?,” Krupp asked George and Harold, his eyes slightly focused, and his voice slurred and raspy. 

 

“Yeah, you kept passing out, and we were scared if we didn’t call an ambulance to come get you, you’d die,” Harold said, fiddling around with his fingers and biting his lip. 

 

Krupp groaned, and rolled over onto his side. Until suddenly, he felt a hand meet his side, and he looked over his hips to see Edith staring at him. 

 

“I’m surprised you didn’t call me Benjamin, I would’ve helped you,” Edith said, rubbing Krupp’s side. 

 

Krupp looked at Edith, and glared at the wall, he noticed that he could see everything in its proper colors, shapes, and conditions. There were no longer loud sounds ringing in the back of his head. 

 

Krupp’s eyes began to water again, and he gave a deep sob, grabbing Edith and hugging her, holding onto her for dear life. He felt so good to finally be able to remain conscious for a longer period of time than five minutes. 

 

Krupp smiled, finally, he smiled, as a nurse walked into the room, and probed his ear with a thermometer. Krupp took a deep inhale, and sighed his exhale as the beep his the inside of his ear. 

 

“104.2”, finally, it was going down, he was safe now. Everything was alright. He’d go home, and get comfortable again snuggled between his blankets. He’d get to relax again, on a cold winter day.

 

He’d finally be granted his one wish, his one desire.

 

A day of peace and quiet.


End file.
